A page of technical phrases for snare drum, in 7/8 time, after Ron Fink’s book of the same name. One thing I admire in anything technical is good structure— I talk about it, meanderingly, in […]
Category: snare drum
Level system warm ups
Here’s a collection of brief exercises working out some basic combinations of strokes— full strokes, down strokes, taps, and up strokes. Called the Level System by some, it refers to how high the stick is […]
Paradiddle-diddles embellished
Some things to do with paradiddle-diddles. This started with this lesson— we were playing them with a slight crescendo, with an accent on the end. These aren’t necessarily great for speed, it doesn’t matter. There […]
Best books: The NARD Book
No commercial publisher could afford to print and publish a compilation similar to this work as a commercial proposition. This book represents the unselfish contribution of many members of the N.A.R.D. and is the first […]
Paradiddles with Bellson
Throwing a bone to fans of Louis Bellson’s Modern Reading Text in 4/4 here, with an easy paradiddle system. Most of these things happen naturally out of my teaching, or my playing; here I just […]
Eight stroke rolls?
Reading George Lawrence Stone’s Technique of Percussion, in a 1953 International Musician column he discusses “compound” rolls— rolls including two accented singles. The six stroke roll is most familiar of that type, the 10 stroke […]
Pataflafla builder
Exceptionally granular page of exercises developing the pataflafla, a drag variant, and Steve Gadd’s pataflafla-ed 6 stroke roll— you can hear that in his solo on the Tom Scott record here. Usually I would walk […]
Rudimental Reed: two methods
A whole lot of snare drum happening right now. Here are two pretty basic things to do with Syncopation on the practice pad, first with short rolls on the short notes and paradiddles on the […]
Paradiddlea
One of my stupidly-named rudiment variations from 2011 here, without the original superfluous hyphen. In this spelling it might entice some people to say para-DID-lee-ah, of which I approve. It’s a five note paradiddle, RLRRL. […]
Paradiddle-diddle phrases – 01
A page of paradiddle-diddle phrases, like some six stroke roll pages from last year. A couple of my students are eating these up. This is how you learn these things, you don’t just go down […]
More short rolls and drags
Following up the page from the other day, here are some more short open roll and drag combinations. I’ve also rewritten the other page in normal notation— download that and compare it with the first […]
Beginning open drags and rolls
UPDATE: I’ve rewritten this page in standard roll/drag notation— in 16th notes in 2/4. You can use the page here as a key if there’s any question of how to interpret it. Basic page of […]